The present invention relates to head restraints for vehicles, and more specifically, to an arrangement for head restraints for rear seats of convertible vehicles having a head restraint attached to, and displaceable with, a U-shaped roll-over bar that can be raised from a lowered position to a support position.
A head restraint for vehicle seats is described in the as yet unpublished German Patent Document DE-A 3,822,461, this head restaint being attached to a U-shaped roll-over bar that can be displaced in height in guides fixed to the vehicle. Each vehicle seat is assigned a roll-over bar which is supported behind the seat on the vehicle floor. Support of a height-adjustable head restraint via a roll-over bar on the vehicle floor is exceptionally stable and is, in principle, simple to provide. This combination of a head restraint with a roll-over bar has, however, the disadvantage that the roll-over bar behind the seat rest uses up a lot of space in the footwell since the head restraint must join the seat rest close to the upper end of the seat rest. The consequent spatial distance of the roll-over bar from the seat close to the floor of the vehicle may even result in there being no room at all for such a roll-over bar to be attached in this region. Alternatively, this could also result in the space for installing further bodywork parts or units being adversely affected.
An object of the present invention is to combine a head restraint of a conventional type with a roll-over bar so as to provide safety in an accident, and thereby use up as little structural space in the motor vehicle as possible.
This and other objects are met by the present invention which provides an arrangement for providing head restraint for rear seats in a convertible vehicle, comprising a U-shaped roll-over bar and an attached head restraint. The roll-over bar is operable to be raised from a lowered position to a support position. The roll-over bar spans a width of the interior of the vehicle, and has lateral legs that stand behind a rear seat rest, these lateral legs being curved equally such that their center of curvature lies on a seat side of the rear seat rest. The head restraint is attached to and displaceable with the roll-over bar.
As a result of its spanning the width of the interior of the vehicle, the legs of the roll-over bar can be attached close to or on the lateral frame rails on the bodywork floor. A stable support is thereby achieved without this attachment requiring additional reinforcements. The legs of the roll-over bar extend along the rear side of the rear seat, bent equally with a center of curvature on the seat side. The roll-over bar thereby takes up only a minimum amount of installation space behind the rear-seat rest while still allowing a raising movement into the support position.
As a result of this arrangement of the roll-over bar, the head restraint can also be integrated into the interior of the vehicle in a particularly elegant manner. This is because the head restraint, together with the roll-over bar, can be lowered, at its furthest extent, to a point beneath a visible upper rim of the lateral bodywork walls such that the head restraint is not visible in the lowered condition. When the roll-over bar is raised, it adjoins a rear-seat rest without any gap, and supports the head of a passenger of any size.
Other objects, advantages and novel features of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description of the invention when considered in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.